Tigerstar's Rejection
by Jumbo Yumbo
Summary: "Redtail..." Runningwind meows through gritted teeth, standing next to me. "Don't be stupid." I want to listen, but I can't. How does he not feel joy at this? His, and my, and so many others', murderer will die today, but will be sent into the Place of No Stars. He will walk alone, where he belongs. (One-shot)


I sit staring at Tigerstar. I spit on the grassy, cool ground. I stand next to Whitestorm, although if he knows I'm here, I can't be sure. Bluestar, standing next to Oakheart, flashes her eyes at me once. We stay silent. We know any words to Leopardstar, Firestar, or Tallstar will be too late. As Firestar reveals Tigerstar's past of trickery and deceit, my tail twitches in delight. I can feel my fellow StarClan warriors stare at me in mixed emotions of anger, frustration, horror, and worry. They must think I'm insane.

"Redtail..." Runningwind meows through gritted teeth, standing next to me. "Don't be stupid." I want to listen, but I can't. How does he not feel joy at this? His, and my, and so many others', murderer will die today, but will be sent into the Place of No Stars. He will walk alone, where he belongs.

Tigerstar leaps at Scourge, sensing his plans. But Scourge fights him off quickly, raking a single claw, which has been replaced with an enormous dog claw, down his throat all the way to his tail. My eyes widen, and Runningwind tenses. We fade quickly into an empty Four Trees, rather than the full one that is real, and Tigerstar flashes in front of us for a couple seconds, but we cannot heal him. Leopardfoot, his mother, leaps over to him, begging him to stay so we can heal him. My fur bristles in unexplained hatred. Firestar is watching the spectacle from the forest, and feels...sympathy! Am I the only cat who thinks he deserves this? Around me, I see Stonefur, Brindleface, all of his victims tensing with worry and guilt. Have they not seen what he's done?

When losing his eighth life, Tigerstar, in obvious pain, stays a bit longer. A few cats near him, me being one of them. I creep forward, and Pinestar, his father, shifts to the side to let me past when he sees the fake look of concern on my face. When I get to the convulsing body of Tigerstar, he looks at me with a hateful glare in his eye.

"You monster!" I hiss. Runningwind takes a step forward, but I ignore him. "How could you do this to so many?" He barely notices me, if at all, but I keep raging. "You killed Stormpaw's mentor right in front of him!" I feel teeth on the scruff of my neck, and keep fighting, even though he is gone. He will be back shortly, to lose his last life. I scent Pinestar pulling me away. My heart is racing, my fur is bristled, and a couple StarClan warriors are staring at me in shock. Most, though, are watching Tigerstar. And after a minute, I am, too.

xxx

We wait in the dark, icy aired meadow. The wall of fog behind us doesn't help the uneasy feeling. Bluestar and Whitestorm are sitting on either side of me, making sure I don't sprint ahead. Twenty cats of StarClan, all of different Clans while living, sit around the clearing. Being here, in the Place of No Stars, sends a chill down my spine, as with probably every cat here. We've been here recently, to send Darkstripe off, although we were never as clear with him as Bluestar plans on being with Tigerstar. Her plans to be clear are to torture him, as even he knows he cannot take on twenty furious cats. I don't think it's enough; he deserves worse than the torture of words, but suspicions of me going crazy are high enough to keep me silent.

Tigerstar appears before us. Bluestar steps forward.

"Tigerstar, you have committed many unspeakable crimes." She meows. My fur bristles.

"Fox dung!" I hiss, and Whitestorm silences me by brushing his tail over my mouth. _I can speak of his crimes!_ I think. _He killed countless cats, sending them to StarClan early. He became leader of another Clan. He broke the warrior code hundreds, if not thousands, of times in his despicable life!_

Bluestar flashes her angry blue eyes at me before continuing; "You will never roam the forests of StarClan. You will never hunger, you will never eat. You will never die, you will never live."

Tigerstar doesn't say word, just watches every move each cat makes. I feel my last meal coming up. I want nothing more than to slice his throat open, only to die nine more times, and face me again, to repeat this fate over and over until I'm pleased. Instead, I sit, muscles tense, fur bristled, until Tigerstar nods slowly and silently, unknowingly dragging out my pain. Bluestar nods in a civilized manner and disappears into the fog, followed by nineteen distressed cats. Before I walk into it, though, I glance back to see Tigerstar walking away, tail high in confidence. I spit in his direction, and get herded into the fog by two cats from RiverClan.

The warm air of StarClan territory touches my pelt, and I look around to see every cat has damp fur from the long trek through the fog. Patchpelt, who was not among the cats who went to the Place of No Stars, runs up to me. He is as young and agile as when he was first made a warrior, and when I first saw him upon joining the ranks of StarClan.

"Would you like to go hunting?" My older brother asks, tail high and eyes bright. He must know I feel down after being in there, although he hasn't been there personally.

"Alright." I meow. We hurry into the forest, and as we pass the shade of a huge willow tree, I could swear I saw Tigerstar's amber eyes in the shadow, glaring at me, digging deeper into my head, driving me insane. I speed away, faster than my brother, faster than Tigerstar, faster than I've ever run, desperate to escape the shadow.


End file.
